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Russia moves S-400 missiles to Crimea, where Ukrainian sailors ‘confess’ on state TV

Ukrainian servicemen attend a military training in Chernihiv region, Ukraine, Wednesday, Nov, 28, 2018. Russia and Ukraine traded blame after Russian border guards on Sunday opened fire on three Ukrainian navy vessels and eventually seized them and their crews. The incident put the two countries on war footing and raised international concern.Photo: Mykola Lazarenko

The Telegraph

Published: November 28, 2018 - 9:58 AM

The Russian military is boosting the defence of the occupied Crimean peninsula with more anti-aircraft missiles in the wake of the weekend standoff with Ukrainian vessels in the Black Sea.

The Interfax news agency on Wednesday quoted Col. Vadim Astafyev, the top Defence Ministry official in Russia’s south, as saying that Russia will add one S-400 anti-aircraft missile system to the three already deployed in the peninsula.

The announcement comes three days after Russian border guards fired on three Ukrainian vessels and seized them and their crews. The first overt military confrontation between the two neighbouring countries has raised the spectre of a major conflict.

Ukrainian sailors were filmed yesterday (Tuesday) giving what Kiev said were forced confessions and brought to court after Russia seized their ships off the coast of Crimea in a major escalation of tensions.

A court in Crimea ruled yesterday that 12 of the 24 sailors and security service agents who were captured would be kept in confinement for two months, with a decision on the rest expected today.

Moscow has defied Western calls to release the men, who have been accused of violating Russia’s borders and face up to six years in prison. At least three of the men are in hospital.

Ukrainian soldier stands guard aboard military boat called “Dondass” moored in Mariupol, Sea of Azov port on November 27, 2018. – Three Ukrainian navy vessels were seized off the coast of Crimea by Russian forces, which fired on and boarded Kiev’s ships after several tense hours of confrontation.

State television has broadcast footage from the interrogation of three of the captives, including an officer who, while reading from a screen, said the ships had deliberately ignored Russian requests to stop.

The head of the Ukrainian navy said the sailors had been forced to give false testimony, noting that several of the men had relatives in Crimea.

Russian ships rammed a tugboat and opened fire on two gunboats that were trying to reach the Ukrainian port of Mariupol through the Kerch Strait on Sunday.

The Ukrainian security service said yesterday that a Russian jet had also fired rockets during the incident, seriously injuring one officer. Special forces later boarded the vessels.

Russia has claimed the incident was a planned “provocation,” while Ukraine has called it an act of aggression.

Although the Azov Sea is, by a 2003 treaty, supposed to be shared between Ukraine and Russia, the Kerch Strait connecting it to the Black Sea has been controlled by Moscow since it annexed Crimea in 2014.

Russia has been demanding that ships receive permission to pass after it opened a bridge over the strait in May.

In a phone call with Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, late on Monday, Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, accused Kiev of “creating yet another conflict situation” before next March’s presidential election in Ukraine, according to a Kremlin statement.

For more than four years, Russia has backed separatists in a conflict in eastern Ukraine that has killed more than 10,000 people.

Tensions have also been rising in the Azov Sea as both sides have detained each other’s fishing vessels. But Sunday’s incident marked the first time Russia has openly attacked Ukrainian forces.

The U.K. has condemned Russia’s “destabilising behaviour in the region and its ongoing violation of Ukrainian territorial integrity”.

At an emergency session of the United Nations in New York on Monday, Russia said the Ukrainian vessels deliberately did not wait for permission to pass through the strait, which was temporarily closed.

The passage under the bridge had been blocked using a tanker.

However, Ukraine said its ships had waited for permission and began withdrawing from the area after they were buzzed by Russian helicopters.

Ukrainian authorities on Wednesday released what they said is the exact location where its vessels were fired on by Russia, showing that they were in international waters.

The statement by Ukrainian officials contradicts Russia’s argument that it was chasing the ships because they were violating its territorial waters. Russia considers Crimea, which it annexed in 2014, part of its country.